Wishing you a "should-less" 2008!

Today you should really get those packages wrapped up and taken to the post office but first you should vacuum and then you should do the dishes. It's cold out so you should wear your warm coat but first you should make sure that button you sewed back on is okay --- and you should use more moisturizer before you go out... blah-blah-blah.

The above is a typical nano-second of life in my brain. I "should" myself all day long. For a long time now I have been cranky about people who "should" me --- "you should write another book", "you should put pictures on that new shawl on your blog", "you should write down the instructions" --- and I am also aware that I tend to "should" other people, too. So this is my New Year's Resolution --- I'm going to try to stop "should"-ing everybody, including myself, and I'm going to try to stop letting people "should" me.

Now there is a case to be made that sometimes we really should do certain things. I should write another book --- well, I am. But I think it is in the nature of the word "should" that so much of the problem arises. Why can't we stop "should"-ing and change to offering an option? "You know, those mittens are so cute you could probably sell them if you felt like making more." That's a nice little compliment that offers an option that can be accepted or discarded.

Most people I know are most brutal with themselves when it comes to should-ing. I should do this, I should do that --- look, is that a helpful way to approach life? Maybe what we need to consider is offering ourselves the same options. Today might be a good day to clean out the garage. Wouldn't it be nice to invite Grandpa for dinner? It's pleasant and you can take the suggestion or not.

When I was growing up my mother was the world's greatest "should"-er. It was a curious and depressing habit of hers because the compliment always carried the kernel of rebuke. Oh, you are so talented at drawing, you should do something with it. I can remember one particularly depressing incident when I showed her a lovely quilted jacket I had spent months making. "It's just gorgeous," she said, "You do such beautiful work. Isn't it a tragedy that you don't do something more with it all that talent?" Wham-blam-thunk.

And the worst part was that, like me, she was harshest when should-ing herself. "I know I should go out in the kitchen and start supper and I should mix up a batch of bread and I should send a loaf over to Mrs. So-and-so but I'm just so lazy..." It was sad and it was doubly sad that I inherited that. A lot of us have.

So for 2008 I am going to try to eliminate those nagging, non-productive, unhelpful shoulds from my speech and from my thoughts. If there is something that needs to be done, either do it or don't do it but don't nag myself about it. And if I feel the need to tell someone in my life that there is something that they ought to be or could be or might be doing, to do it in a useful way that lets them know I have an idea for them but it is purely optional, I'm not going to guilt them into doing what I think they "should" do.

I've been thinking a lot about the nature of passive-aggression anyway. I don't think that's my problem --- I'm just plain aggressive. Nothing passive about it. But passive-aggression is a nasty little trait that allows us to "should" people in sneaky, under-handed ways while maintaining our self-perception of concern and helpfulness. I want to keep an eye on that in myself and in those I deal with and --- should I slip up, someone should point it out.

I wish you a calm, quiet, loving, and creative 2008. Be generous with compliments, stingy with complaints, take time to be quiet, give thanks everyday, find a pursuit that you can do alone and that fulfills you, and don't forget to read a book.

Thanks for reading --- and to my family, wherever you may be, the sauerkraut is cooking and will be ready in a couple hours. Hope yours is too! Love you!